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novel Core by Paul Preuss. It concerns a team that has to drill to the center
of the Earth and set off a series ofnuclear explosions in order to restart the
rotation of Earth's core. The Core was directed byJon Amiel, and
starred Aaron Eckhart, Delroy Lindo, Tchéky Karyo, Hilary Swank, DJ
Qualls,Bruce Greenwood, and Stanley Tucci.
Plot
Scientific Inaccuracies
This section may contain original research or unverified claims.
While Hollywood science fiction films often tend to bend the laws of science
in order to create a more compelling plot and keep the audience
engaged, The Core bends the laws much more than most other big-budget
films. Critics and scientists in general have pointed out multiple scientific
inaccuracies and plot holes in the film:
In geology
The Mariana Trench was described as being in the South Pacific, but it
is actually located in the western North Pacific.
Much of the Earth from the mantle inward is shown as liquid in the
movie; however, the only wholly liquid layer of the Earth's interior is
the outer core. Many researchers suspect that much of the Mantle is
solid, except for magma that is contained in "pockets" within
the lithosphere. However, little is known about the precise composition
of the inner Earth.
Though most scientists agree that the rotation of the Earth's liquid
metal core is key to the Earth's magnetosphere functioning properly,
the exact mechanism is not well understood. Furthermore, it is highly
unlikely that anything short of a major cosmic impact event could stop
the core's rotation completely; in which case, a diminished magnetic
field would be the least of human troubles.
The magma would have filled the giant geode seen in the movie in
much less time than it did on screen because of the extreme pressures
that are present at that depth.
At the end of the movie, the ship is said to be rising between two
tectonic plates "near Hawaii". Hawaii is in the center of the Pacific
plate. There are no tectonic plate boundaries near Hawaii.
When the ship is stuck in the geode, it is unnecessary for the crew to
stay outside of the ship once they realized that the magma could have
melted the crystals. The ship is impervious to the magma while the
crystals weren't. The magma would have melted the crystals and left
the ship unscathed.
In physics
Five large H-bombs are used to restart core rotation, each with a
200 megaton yield. The largest H-bomb ever built, the Tsar Bomba,
was designed for a 100 megaton yield, but it was limited to a 50
megaton yield to lessen the fallout. It weighed 25 tons and was 8
meters long and 3 meters in diameter. The bombs shown in the movie
are roughly human-sized and can be pushed around by one or two
people.
The last bomb had to be 30% larger, or another 60 megatons had to
be added to its yield. The fuel rods from the nuclear reactor (seven
kilograms of plutonium) are used as additional fissile material. Such an
amount of plutonium (Keyes lifted it around, and it was only the size
of his torso) could not generate that much explosive force. The Fat
Manbomb used roughly this amount of plutonium and had a
20 kiloton yield. Later improved bombs using this amount of plutonium
still yielded less than 50 kilotons, less than a tenth of a percent of
what was required.
Furthermore, Keyes's approach of just leaning the plutonium reactor
core against the bomb would have done nothing for yield. For fissile
material to affect yield, it must be part of the weapon's physics
package, not placed nearby. Since the weapons in the movie were
ostensibly French, the implication would be that these would be
implosion-type thermonuclear weapons. Ergo, unless the nuclear
material was shaped perfectly and was within the explosive "crush
sphere" in the bomb's physics package, there would be no effect on
yield. The reactor core would merely be vaporized.
The nuclear explosions depicted in the movie were roughly spherical. A
spherical explosion would produce no torque on the Earth's core, and
thus would be unable to start its rotation.
Even with a total yield of one gigaton, the explosions would not be
nearly powerful enough to start or even influence rotation in the outer
core, which is roughly the size ofMars. The effect would be akin to
attempting to impart a current into a swimming pool using small
fireworks.
During the preparation, it is made clear that the calculations upon
which success or failure hinged were based on 'guesses' about core
density.
Nuclear reactors use uranium-235 at a 3-4% ratio to the uranium-238,
whereas nuclear weapons with uranium use 90% uranium-235 almost
all nuclear weapons use plutonium now. some plutonium may have
been made in the reactor but there would still be far to
few fissile atoms and far too many fertile atoms